Learning and Retention

Employees are no longer staying at one organization for the duration of his or her career. It is increasingly common for employees to change organizations or positions several times. While this can be very positive for the employee and allows them to find the best position and organizational fit, organizations often suffer from the high cost of hiring and training when existing employees choose to leave.

A question that many organizations face time and time again is, “How do we keep the most talented employees? How do we make them want to stay here?” The answers to these questions is not easy. There are often many factors and reasons for why a talented employee decides to leave an organization. Some of the factors the organization may have control over, and others the organization may not have any control over. Continue Reading →

Communication, Education & Training, Employee Engagement, Employee Life Cycle, Employee Retention, Employees Leaving, Leadership, talent management Shortlink

Avoiding the Survey Slump

Here’s a must read for all companies who have surveyed their employees in the past, gather the results, but don’t follow through with action planning, or a grand attempt is made in the beginning, but fizzles out as time wears on.

An excerpt from the article describes the “Survey Slump”:

“In many survey processes, a phenomena called the “survey slump” seems to set in somewhere between the delivery of survey results and the launch of the next survey. Organizations that conduct employee surveys on a regular basis know this time well. Excitement builds around the delivery of the results as managers look to see if their scores have improved (or declined). Everyone wants to know if the actions taken had any effect.”

Here is the article, “Avoiding the Survey Slump” in its entirety. Let me know what you think about it.

Behavioral Science, Employee Surveys, HR Surveys, Human Resources, Work Environment Shortlink

Oh Donuts!

One of my biggest tests of discipline occurs when the beloved treats show up in my office. All it takes is someone to say to me, “Hey Gail, so and so brought donuts” and my stomach can’t seem to resist. The problem is that this occurs too frequently and I often find myself in a battle against my stomach. I don’t keep sweets in my house for a reason; I will eat them. Sweets are my biggest weakness as my sweet tooth is insatiable. So when there are sweets at work, it’s like a field day for my sweet tooth.

Can I resist the sweets? Sometimes yes and sometimes no. I have found that when I come to work prepared, I am less likely to sneak in a sweet. I often keep healthy options at my desk such as a granola bar or fruit. I often get low blood sugar, which forces me to eat every few hours. When I have something in my stomach, I’m less likely to be tempted by a brownie or other sweet. It’s easier to tell myself, “No, I don’t need that donut, I’ve got something to eat right here” then “Well, I don’t have anything at my desk to eat and I am hungry.” I find that when I’m either hungry or forgot to bring a snack that I am more likely to snatch whatever is around the office. Continue Reading →

Health & Fitness at Work, Human Resources, Miscellaneous, Work Life Balance Shortlink

Work Less, But Keep Your Job

A growing trend in organizations is to cut hours among employees rather than cutting employees altogether. Maybe an organization can only afford to pay for someone working 30 hours a week as opposed to working the standard 40 hours a week. While some would argue that this would result in a significant pay cut, others would be happy enough that they would still be employed.
The positive side of this solution is that organizations are demonstrating that they are working hard to come up with alternatives to laying off employees. Some of the situations may just be temporary while the organization re-structures itself and its employees. Others may be long term to avoid letting employees go.

The downside to cutting hours is that the employee may experience feelings of loss and a decrease in organizational commitment. Losing part of your salary can have an impact on how one feels about their self. Anytime you alter an employee’s salary, there are negative consequences that may occur. Whoever delivers the news of the cutting of hours must do so with sensitivity and understand that the employee may not respond positively regardless of the fact that they have not been laid off. Simply saying, “Well, at least you didn’t lose your job” is not the most effective and conscious comment to make. Continue Reading →

Communication, Education & Training, Employee Engagement, Employee Retention, Employees Leaving, Ethics, Human Resources, Leadership Shortlink

Is There an Equal Balance?

Think about your current job or a project you have recently worked on with others. Was there an equal balance between what you were putting into your work and what you received as a result of your work? Your answer may play a significant role in how you feel about your job or the completion of a project. It is difficult to feel satisfaction when you feel the benefits you receive from hard work are not adequate.


Equity theory is centered on the belief that we all have notions of how much we are putting into our work and what we are obtaining in return. Salary is the easiest way to demonstrate how an employee may feel an unequal balance. For example, if you are working long hours, taking on more responsibilities, and have been working for the organization for a long amount of time, you may feel you deserve a certain amount of compensation. Continue Reading →

Behavioral Science, Communication, Employee Life Cycle, Employee Retention, Employees Leaving, Human Resources Shortlink

How Much is Too Much


Any easy way to break tension in the workplace is to bring in humor. People tend to feel more at ease when they are able to joke with one another. During times of high stress within a work environment, humor can be a coping method that employees use to release the tension. While this is a great way to encourage strong relationships among employees, is there a limit?

We all know someone in our workplace that tends to go a bit overboard when joking. Is there a line that can be crossed? The answer is of course, yes. What is this line and how do we prevent employees from crossing it? Continue Reading →

Communication, Education & Training, Ethics, Generations in the Workplace, Leadership, Legalities, Miscellaneous Shortlink

Development of an Organizational Stress Support Seeking Scale

Anyone who has created a scale knows that it is hard work! My peers and I had the opportunity to create a scale for my Testing & Measurement course. We developed the scale, administered it to undergraduate students, and ran analysis to examine the reliability of our newly developed scale.

During stressful work situations, often people seek support to relieve the symptoms of stress. Support can be sought from many different sources. For example, employees most commonly seek support from their organization as well as friends and family. Both forms of social support have been studied heavily in the past. Spiritual support has not been studied in the context of the workplace. Therefore, the purpose of our scale was to examine not only organizational and friend/family support, but also spiritual support.

In creating the scale, an equal number of items involved organizational, friend/family, and spiritual support. In total, there were 27 items. Examples of items include (using a 7-point Likert scale):

When faced with this type of situation, I would…

Continue Reading →

Behavioral Science, Human Resources, Work Environment, Work Life Balance Shortlink

What Does Your Email Voice Sound Like?

I’ve been emailing for at least 20 years. Occasionally, I’ll read an old printed email and wonder, “Did I write this?” Most of the time, I’m pleased with what I wrote. I’m sure that happens to be because I only save printed emails I feel are well-written or necessary to save in my physical files for posterity.

Just recently, I’m starting to realize that my email voice is very different from my spoken voice. I discovered this one day after speaking in the same tones and using the same words as my written voice. I felt like I was having an out of the body experience or something. Then I thought, “Boy, I sound hoity-toity.” After a micro-second of thinking about that, to my horror, I began to stutter!

Would I rather sound like my email voice when I speak – without the stuttering? It depends. Naturally, when involved in business issues, I’d like to sound professional, so that at least I look like I know what I’m talking about. If I’m speaking casually to someone, I don’t want to sound stuffy or condescending. Perhaps there are some who don’t think I sound high-toned in my emails at all. Continue Reading →

Behavioral Science, Communication Shortlink

Women in the Workforce

As mentioned in an earlier post, the number of working women is increasing. Women currently hold more masters degrees than the male population. I read an interesting article in Bloomberg Businessweek that examined another angle of this topic. The article addressed how business women that wish to have a strong career are still able to raise a family and have a relationship with a spouse.

A couple of different families were profiled in this article and discussed how their families are able to function with a career driven woman in the family. In most cases, the man stays at home and cares for the children. The article made it appear that all the men were okay with being stay-at-home dads rather than pursuing their own career. The men all appeared to be very supportive of their wives’ choice to have a very strong career. Continue Reading →

Communication, Miscellaneous, Women in the Workplace, Work Environment, Work Life Balance Shortlink

Three Components of a Killer Exit Interview

by Kyle Lagunas

Fact: When an employee leaves, all of the time, energy and resources you invested in them walks out the door. Though some organizations will have employees take a brief exit survey, they’re doing little to learn how the company can better attract and retain top talent in the future.

A formal process for managing the end of an employee’s lifecycle–offboarding–is an HR department’s diamond in the rough. They’re your last chance to capture honest feedback from an employee. But you should be doing more than just collecting data. “The organizations that get offboarding right are able to capture feedback and make it actionable,” says Lars Schmidt, Director of Talent Acquisition at NPR. Continue Reading →

Behavioral Science, Communication, Employee Retention, Employees Leaving, Exit Surveys, talent management Shortlink

Ideas People Want to Work With – Summit 2012

 

A midst all the emails, blogs, and other online communications regarding HR trends in the workplace, there’s nothing quite like people gathering together physically in one spot to discuss them in person. That is what this year’s Summit 2012; “Ideas People Want to Work With” will achieve. It will be held in New York New York City on February 29 – March 1, 2012.

Our company, TNS Employee Insights, will be partnering with JWT Inside, a specialist division of JWT which helps organizations advance employee engagement, deliver integrated employment communication strategies, and provides innovative employee relationship marketing that engages the workforce throughout the entire employee life-cycle.

What will be interesting is that we speakers from Fortune companies, which will include United Technologies (UTC), InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG), and Hospital Corporations of America (HCA). So, if you wish to attend, please let me know and I can send you some information.

Miscellaneous Shortlink